Senate c’ttee re-jigging will engender peace – Marafa

The newly appointed Chairman of the Senate Committee on Petroleum Resources (Downstream), Kabiru Marafa, (Zamfara Central), has said that reshuffling of committees was part of reconciliatory moves to end crisis in the Senate and All Progressives Congress (APC).

He described as a joke, any plan to impeach President Muhammadu Buhari.

While describing such exercise as normal parliamentary practice, Marafa, who is the spokesman of the Unity Forum senators, told State House correspondents after meeting with the President at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, that it would bring peace to the Senate.

He said: “I think reshuffling of committees is not new in any parliament. What made that of yesterday (Thursday) a little new is the circumstances of the emergence of this leadership and what followed.
“What happened yesterday is a result of the efforts the party has been putting in for reconciliation in the last few days.”‎

Marafa admitted that peace has returned to the Senate as long as the party comes in and the will of the party is respected.

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“We are not at loggerhead with anybody. It is not like we hate somebody.

“Senate President Bukola Saraki has been one of my very close friends and senior in the 7th Assembly. What you saw happened is what I will describe as loyalty to the party.”

Asked if the Unity Forum senators would be withdrawing the case in court, he said it was the party that has the final say on that.

“We didn’t go to court because we didn’t like the faces of those that emerged, but this is the will of our party.

“During the 7th Assembly, we accorded the ruling party at that time the utmost cooperation and we knew the committees that we were given that time.

“But now we are in power, it is our own time and we should be accorded all the necessary cooperation. We should be seen to respect the party.

“If the party says withdraw the case, we will go on to withdraw the case,” he said.

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